Sheer ignorance of the symbiotic relationship of these wetlands with the city of Calcutta and a callousness of the authorities responsible for its conservation have led to the present state of affairs.

The wetlands have been in the news recently with extensive coverage on a `water park' project. State fisheries minister Kiranmoy Nanda has criticised the West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation (WBIDC) for allowing a water park project for which a 50-year-old bheri (shallow fish pond) off Eastern Metropolitan Bypass would be filled up for the approach way to the proposed park, flouting the West Bengal Inland Fisheries Act, 1984. Thebheri is at least one km away from the park and finds no mention in the map submitted to the Green Bench, from which the promoter of the project has got a green signal.

The irony lies in that the multiple functions of these wetlands has not been understood, and adequate measures are not being made for conservation, while on the other hand, real estate is very active in taking over land in the wetlands area for urban encroachment. It is a classic conjunction of institutional indifference and real estate activity.

The threat to the bheris or fish ponds is the cardinal problem being faced by the wetlands, which is spread over a huge area of 12,500 hectares. These wetland is designated as conservation area by a landmark judgment by a bench of the Calcutta High Court in 1992. The conservation area boundary, which includes Bidhannagar South, Sonarpur, Tiljala and Bhangor, was marked out in 1986 by the State Planning Board based on seminal research carried out by Dhrubajyoti Ghosh, a UN Global 500 laureate forhis work in these wetlands.

The wetlands have multiple functions, and are the largest domestic waste recycling area in the world created and developed by the local people using wastewater from Calcutta. The use of these wetlands lies in naturally treating the wastewater that Calcutta generates everyday, in successive resource recovery systems of pisciculture, vegetable farming and garbage farming. The famous Dhapa Square Mile, which falls under the conservation area, is used for dumping solid waste and garbage farming.

A baseline document for management action plan for the East Calcutta Wetlands and Waste Recycling Region, commissioned by the Calcutta Metropolitan Water & Sanitation Authority (CMWSA) and prepared by the Creative Research Group, says Calcutta saves Rs 400 crore as a one-time cost for installation and Rs 100 crore for routine maintenance of a conventional sewage treatment plant.

How is this amazing cost saving possible? The sewage generated daily reaches around 284 bheris (fish ponds).Sunlight acts on the shallow ponds to enhance algae growth which in turn supports bacterial population for degrading the organic materials. The pond effluent is rich in phosphate. The water, after being used in the ponds, is further used for irrigation purposes in vegetable farming and paddy cultivation.

The baseline document puts fish production at about 10,900 tonnes in 1995-96, vegetable production at 150 tonnes per day and paddy production at 15,000 tonnes (mostly the winter variety) per year. The overall yield of paddy in sewage-fed farms is about 2.5tonnes/hectare.

The wetlands face a pincer attack-dwindling supply of wastewater caused by bad maintenance and urban encroachment. The bheris are supposed to get a regular supply of sewage supervised by the Calcutta Drainage Outfall (CDO) division of the Irrigation & Waterways (I&W) Department. The Calcutta Municipal Corporation is responsible for the pumping of the water.

According to experts, wastewater level needs to be maintained at 8 feet 6 inchesgrade trigonometric survey (GTS) at Bantala point and 9 feet GTS at Topsia Point A. But Chabbish Pargana Fish Producers Association general secretary Premtosh Ghosh alleges that the water level is being maintained at 7 feet 6 inches in Bantala and 8 feet at Topsia, causing problems in sewage availability.

CDO division sources admit the existence of the problem but according to them, this is primarily a drainage channel being used as a multipurpose channel. ``And holding up the water at Bantala leads to continuous silt deposition in the channels, which is expensive to clean up. Besides, CMC sources say they are unable to pump the water if it goes above a level of 8 feet,'' they say.

Dhrubajyoti Ghosh has an explanation for the phenomenon of silting. ``It is advisable to allow as much of sewage as possible to fish ponds so that a considerable portion of silt load travels to such ponds. In addition, if the siltation takes place at an earlier point, it can be de-silted more easily than the silt gettingdeposited at a later point near the mouth of the Kulti due to tidal lock taking place twice a day. Moreover, the amount of silt that is not trapped in the channel goes to the river Kulti and raises its bed, so much so that the river may in the near future lose its conservancy. Allowing silt to reach the river Kulti can be disastrous for the city's drainage,'' he points out.

CMC's attitude to this has been the strangest. CMC deputy chief engineer (drainage), Dilip Sanyal said that this ecosystem is a unique one in the world, but consistently refused to admit that any problem exists with the water level. ``It is an infructuous word (sic) to say what the actual water level is-eight and half feet or 10 feet is unimportant,'' says he.

His reluctance to admit the existence of a problem could be explained by a meeting on June 20 last year in the chamber of fisheries minister Kiranmoy Nanda. Premtosh Ghosh, who was present at the meeting, revealed that CMC chief engineer drainage Raghav Das had inadvertentlydisclosed that the two underground conduits reaching Topsia Point A had become choked. They had not been cleaned since 1968, when the I&W department had assumed charge. Hence the problem of allowing water to go beyond 8 feet while pumping, and the resultant problem in sewage reaching the fish ponds.

What is not understood by policy makers is that it is important to conserve an existing natural wastewater treatment system that is vital for the sustenance of Calcutta. Glaring institutional indifference has led to the present state of affairs and unless something is done fast, Calcutta stands to lose its most vital natural subsidy.

A feast for real estate sharks

The East Calcutta Wetlands has become a bonanza for real estate sharks. Bheri owners in Kheyada village in Sonarpur fear that deliberate attempt to choke the operations of the bheris, by not supplying sewage for over a decade now, has led to the entry of real estate agents. Not surprisingly, Sonarpur, which has the maximum of 20 mouzas outof the 32 mouzas that come under the conservation area, has been witness to the maximum number of land conversions.

The Land Use and Development Control Plan for the Eastern Fringe of Calcutta states that ``no change in land use is permitted''. But such a clear legal statement has been given the short shrift by realtors, who have been converting land at an alarming rate.

State fisheries minister Kiranmoy Nanda told this correspondent that other than the water park, his department had no knowledge of bheris being filled up for real estate purposes. But investigations by The Financial Express revealed that land conversions have taken place in some mouzas. In Karimpur mouza in Kheyada II, for example, 330 bighas of khas (vested) land exist, of which 25 bighas have been converted. Other places where conversion has taken place are Chak Kalar Khal mouza, Atghara mouza, Bhagabanpur mouza and Tarda mouza, to mention a few. Some of the names involved are Calcutta Land & Housing Development Corporation,Diamond Housing, Pragati Housing, Radha Housing and Brindaban Garden Housing.

Even in places where garbage farming is done, there is news of jheels above five cottahs being filled up. These jheels are recorded water bodies and are shown in the mouza maps. Group Captain A K Chakravarty, who is advisor to the Calcutta Municipal Corporation on solid waste management sidetracked the issue saying, ``Whatever we do is within the designated area for dumping.''

However, this contravenes the West Bengal Inland Fisheries Act (1984), that says water bodies above five cottahs cannot be filled up. Also, any filling up of these jheels is not permissible according to the provisions of the land use and development control plan provided by CMDA for this area. Interestingly, environmental experts have been repeatedly telling CMC to restore these jheels and prevent use of raw sewage from outfall canals to grow vegetables. Use of raw sewage causes toxicity in vegetables.